What is the name of your organization?
Shoulder to Shoulder, Inc.
What is the name of your solution?
CREE (Sp. - Believe - CREE.HN)
Provide a one-line summary or tagline for your solution.
Improve school readiness; Expand Digital Educational Model for Schools and hands-on learning; and Improve Literacy Creating Community Love of Reading.
In what city, town, or region is your solution team headquartered?
Camasca, Intibucá
In what country is your solution team headquartered?
HND
What type of organization is your solution team?
Nonprofit
Film your elevator pitch.
What specific problem are you solving?
According to the World Bank, Honduran education is among the worst in the world outside of sub-Saharan Africa, relying mostly on rote lesson presentations by poorly paid, under-trained teachers. There are over 3 million school-age children in Honduras, of which 90,000 live in the department (= state) of Intibucá. Many students must walk long distances to school, effectively eliminating those who cannot make the trek. Rural schools often do not have enough textbooks for the students. Teachers write lessons on a blackboard; students copy them into notebooks and memorize the material. There are limited opportunities for interactive learning. Social promotion is widespread.
Hondurans as a rule do not have a tradition of reading and most homes lack the presence of books or other educational material to prepare students for school.
As a result, many students lack the literacy skills to master more complex material. Almost HALF do not stay in school beyond grade 6.
With such poor job skills, many students are consigned to manual labor. Others chose to leave their home country to find a job that pays a living wage.
These grim choices are harmful to families and limit Honduras growing intellectual capital needed for long-term development.
What is your solution?
Our approach is to enhance the quality and attractiveness of rural Honduran education by adding engaging technology to schools and creating community-based support structures to maintain it.
Our program consists of:
1. Improved School Readiness - We provide Kinders with TVs delivering digital resources containing shapes, letters, sounds, and games plus a digital library of books on Kolibri for the teacher to read to the students. We also provide LEGOs and LEGO figures to support interactive learning, creativity, and storytelling.
2. Engaging Digital Curriculum - We enhance the lesson presentations with Kolibri, which delivers the official Honduran textbooks enriched by resources like Khan Academy - WITHOUT the need for the Internet. We have a digital rights agreement with the Honduran government that allows us to host the official textbooks in Kolibri, plus access to their national grade database. With the transaction-level usage data we obtain from Kolibri and student grades, we can correlate usage with retention and achievement.
3. Focus on Literacy - We sponsor department-wide multilevel reading contests. These are run by school principals, local mayors, and municipal education directors leading up to a department winner. Last year, over 30,000 kids participated.
4. Hands-on Enrichment - We sponsor community robotics competitions.
Who does your solution serve, and in what ways will the solution impact their lives?
Our community is Lenca indigenous people in Intibucá and Lempira, Honduras and nearby El Salvador. Honduras is very poor (https://www.statista.com/statistics/1287649/poverty-rate-latin-america/ and these areas are among the poorest.
They are remote with mostly unpaved roads. The Internet, where available, is slow and unreliable.
The principal employment is subsistence farming. This area is in the UN-designated "Dry Corridor" severely affected by Climate Change.
Due to the population leaving for better opportunities, often illegally to the US, teachers are being asked to teach more than one grade - often without enough textbooks for all the students.
Kolibri relieves the teacher from having to write lessons on the blackboard and instead provides them with engaging video lessons linked to the official curriculum. A Kolibri laptop server easily holds all the textbooks and lessons for primary school, facilitating access to remedial material as needed.
Kolibri tablets can hold hundreds of age-appropriate books, supporting improved literacy and curiosity.
With Kolibri, we reach kids who cannot get to school due to disability.
We want more children to stay in school longer and graduate with job skills so they can get living wage jobs domestically and build a bright future for Honduras.